The presence of impulse noise can occur in digital subscriber line (xDSL) systems due to electromagnetic interference from such sources as a telephone network, power system, and even from natural phenomena such as thunderstorms and lightning. The presence of impulse noise can significantly limit the reliability of real-time services such as video that can be supported by current generation xDSL systems, for example, VDSL (Very High Speed DSL). In particular, impulse noise can cause physical layer CRC errors and loss of packets in xDSL systems, thereby affecting such triple-play services as IPTV. As the demand for these services increases and as telephone companies realize the added value in efficiently utilizing their local loops, robust designs for impulse noise monitors to collect and analyze the impulse noise statistics for better characterization of impulse noise are required.